History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
Thus the two cousins parted, and Sophia repaired directly to Lady
Bellaston, where she found a most hearty, as well as a most polite,
welcome. The lady had taken a great fancy to her when she had seen her
formerly with her aunt Western. She was indeed extremely glad to see
her, and was no sooner acquainted with the reasons which induced her
to leave the squire and to fly to London than she highly applauded her
sense and resolution; and after expressing the highest satisfaction in
the opinion which Sophia had declared she entertained of her ladyship,
by chusing her house for an asylum, she promised her all the
protection which it was in her power to give.
As we have now brought Sophia into safe hands, the reader will, I
apprehend, be contented to deposit her there a while, and to look a
little after other personages, and particularly poor Jones, whom we
have left long enough to do penance for his past offences, which, as
is the nature of vice, brought sufficient punishment upon him
themselves.
BOOK XII.
CONTAINING THE SAME INDIVIDUAL TIME WITH THE FORMER.
Chapter i.
Showing what is to be deemed plagiarism in a modern author, and what
is to be considered as lawful prize.
The learned reader must have observed that in the course of this
mighty work, I have often translated passages out of the best antient
authors, without quoting the original, or without taking the least
notice of the book from whence they were borrowed.
This conduct in writing is placed in a very proper light by the
ingenious Abbé Bannier, in his preface to his Mythology, a work of
great erudition and of equal judgment. “It will be easy,” says he,
“for the reader to observe that I have frequently had greater regard
to him than to my own reputation: for an author certainly pays him a
considerable compliment, when, for his sake, he suppresses learned
quotations that come in his way, and which would have cost him but the
bare trouble of transcribing.”
To fill up a work with these scraps may, indeed, be considered as a
downright cheat on the learned world, who are by such means imposed
upon to buy a second time, in fragments and by retail, what they have
already in gross, if not in their memories, upon their shelves; and it
is still more cruel upon the illiterate, who are drawn in to pay for
what is of no manner of use to them. A writer who intermixes great
quantity of Greek and Latin with his works, deals by the ladies and
fine gentlemen in the same paultry manner with which they are treated
by the auctioneers, who often endeavour so to confound and mix up
their lots, that, in order to purchase the commodity you want, you are
obliged at the same time to purchase that which will do you no
service.
And yet, as there is no conduct so fair and disinterested but that it
may be misunderstood by ignorance, and misrepresented by malice, I
have been sometimes tempted to preserve my own reputation at the
expense of my reader, and to transcribe the original, or at least to
quote chapter and verse, whenever I have made use either of the
thought or expression of another. I am, indeed, in some doubt that I
have often suffered by the contrary method; and that, by suppressing
the original author's name, I have been rather suspected of plagiarism
than reputed to act from the amiable motive assigned by that justly
celebrated Frenchman.
Now, to obviate all such imputations for the future, I do here confess
and justify the fact. The antients may be considered as a rich common,
where every person who hath the smallest tenement in Parnassus hath a
free right to fatten his muse. Or, to place it in a clearer light, we
moderns are to the antients what the poor are to the rich. By the poor
here I mean that large and venerable body which, in English, we call
the mob. Now, whoever hath had the honour to be admitted to any degree
of intimacy with this mob, must well know that it is one of their
established maxims to plunder and pillage their rich neighbours
without any reluctance; and that this is held to be neither sin nor
shame among them. And so constantly do they abide and act by this
maxim, that, in every parish almost in the kingdom, there is a kind of
confederacy ever carrying on against a certain person of opulence
called the squire, whose property is considered as free-booty by all
his poor neighbours; who, as they conclude that there is no manner of
guilt in such depredations, look upon it as a point of honour and
moral obligation to conceal, and to preserve each other from
punishment on all such occasions.
In like manner are the antients, such as Homer, Virgil, Horace,
Cicero, and the rest, to be esteemed among us writers, as so many
wealthy squires, from whom we, the poor of Parnassus, claim an
immemorial custom of taking whatever we can come at. This liberty I
demand, and this I am as ready to allow again to my poor neighbours in
their turn. All I profess, and all I require of my brethren, is to
maintain the same strict honesty among ourselves which the mob show to
one another. To steal from one another is indeed highly criminal and
indecent; for this may be strictly stiled defrauding the poor
(sometimes perhaps those who are poorer than ourselves), or, to set it
under the most opprobrious colours, robbing the spittal.
Since, therefore, upon the strictest examination, my own conscience
cannot lay any such pitiful theft to my charge, I am contented to
plead guilty to the former accusation; nor shall I ever scruple to
take to myself any passage which I shall find in an antient author to
my purpose, without setting down the name of the author from whence it
was taken. Nay, I absolutely claim a property in all such sentiments
the moment they are transcribed into my writings, and I expect all
readers henceforwards to regard them as purely and entirely my own.
This claim, however, I desire to be allowed me only on condition that
I preserve strict honesty towards my poor brethren, from whom, if ever
I borrow any of that little of which they are possessed, I shall never
fail to put their mark upon it, that it may be at all times ready to
be restored to the right owner.
The omission of this was highly blameable in one Mr Moore, who, having
formerly borrowed some lines of Pope and company, took the liberty to
transcribe six of them into his play of the Rival Modes. Mr Pope,
however, very luckily found them in the said play, and, laying violent
hands on his own property, transferred it back again into his own
works; and, for a further punishment, imprisoned the said Moore in the
loathsome dungeon of the Dunciad, where his unhappy memory now
remains, and eternally will remain, as a proper punishment for such
his unjust dealings in the poetical trade.
Chapter ii.
In which, though the squire doth not find his daughter, something is
found which puts an end to his pursuit.
The history now returns to the inn at Upton, whence we shall first
trace the footsteps of Squire Western; for, as he will soon arrive at
an end of his journey, we shall have then full leisure to attend our
heroe.
The reader may be pleased to remember that the said squire departed
from the inn in great fury, and in that fury he pursued his daughter.
The hostler having informed him that she had crossed the Severn, he
likewise past that river with his equipage, and rode full speed,
vowing the utmost vengeance against poor Sophia, if he should but
overtake her.
He had not gone far before he arrived at a crossway. Here he called a
short council of war, in which, after hearing different opinions, he
at last gave the direction of his pursuit to fortune, and struck
directly into the Worcester road.
In this road he proceeded about two miles, when he began to bemoan
himself most bitterly, frequently crying out, “What pity is it! Sure
never was so unlucky a dog as myself!” And then burst forth a volley
of oaths and execrations.
The parson attempted to administer comfort to him on this occasion.
“Sorrow not, sir,” says he, “like those without hope. Howbeit we have
not yet been able to overtake young madam, we may account it some good
fortune that we have hitherto traced her course aright. Peradventure
she will soon be fatigated with her journey, and will tarry in some
inn, in order to renovate her corporeal functions; and in that case,
in all moral certainty, you will very briefly be _compos voti_.”
“Pogh! d--n the slut!” answered the squire, “I am lamenting the loss
of so fine a morning for hunting. It is confounded hard to lose one of
the best scenting days, in all appearance, which hath been this
season, and especially after so long a frost.”
Whether Fortune, who now and then shows some compassion in her
wantonest tricks, might not take pity of the squire; and, as she had
determined not to let him overtake his daughter, might not resolve to
make him amends some other way, I will not assert; but he had hardly
uttered the words just before commemorated, and two or three oaths at
their heels, when a pack of hounds began to open their melodious
throats at a small distance from them, which the squire's horse and
his rider both perceiving, both immediately pricked up their ears, and
the squire, crying, “She's gone, she's gone! Damn me if she is not
gone!” instantly clapped spurs to the beast, who little needed it,
having indeed the same inclination with his master; and now the whole
company, crossing into a corn-field, rode directly towards the hounds,
with much hallowing and whooping, while the poor parson, blessing
himself, brought up the rear.
Thus fable reports that the fair Grimalkin, whom Venus, at the desire
of a passionate lover, converted from a cat into a fine woman, no
sooner perceived a mouse than, mindful of her former sport, and still
retaining her pristine nature, she leaped from the bed of her husband
to pursue the little animal.
What are we to understand by this? Not that the bride was displeased
with the embraces of her amorous bridegroom; for, though some have
remarked that cats are subject to ingratitude, yet women and cats too
will be pleased and purr on certain occasions. The truth is, as the
sagacious Sir Roger L'Estrange observes, in his deep reflections,
that, “if we shut Nature out at the door, she will come in at the
window; and that puss, though a madam, will be a mouser still.” In the
same manner we are not to arraign the squire of any want of love for
his daughter; for in reality he had a great deal; we are only to
consider that he was a squire and a sportsman, and then we may apply
the fable to him, and the judicious reflections likewise.
The hounds ran very hard, as it is called, and the squire pursued over
hedge and ditch, with all his usual vociferation and alacrity, and
with all his usual pleasure; nor did the thoughts of Sophia ever once
intrude themselves to allay the satisfaction he enjoyed in the chace,
which, he said, was one of the finest he ever saw, and which he swore
was very well worth going fifty miles for. As the squire forgot his
daughter, the servants, we may easily believe, forgot their mistress;
and the parson, after having expressed much astonishment, in Latin, to
himself, at length likewise abandoned all farther thoughts of the
young lady, and, jogging on at a distance behind, began to meditate a
portion of doctrine for the ensuing Sunday.
The squire who owned the hounds was highly pleased with the arrival of
his brother squire and sportsman; for all men approve merit in their
own way, and no man was more expert in the field than Mr Western, nor
did any other better know how to encourage the dogs with his voice,
and to animate the hunt with his holla.
Sportsmen, in the warmth of a chace, are too much engaged to attend to